Never Knows Best
by Malevolent-Chan
Summary: Naruto's group, typical highschool screw-ups. In truth, Naruto hides behind his trouble-free grin, stifling his pain in drugs and jokes, constantly running from what waits at home, school pressures, and thoughts of his future or lack of. As he learns repeatedly, all he has is now, and the people there despite all—Sasuke and Kiba. And they're going to try having fun in the meantime.


**Author's Note:**

Hello everyone! So, with this story I'm still trying to decide what direction I want it to go in. Hope you like it.

**Disclaimer:**

Hell if I own Naruto.

* * *

><p><span><strong>Never Knows Best - Chapter 1<strong>

Naruto smiles goofily, walking out onto the balcony where he and his friends sit everyday. He spots them sitting and hitting each other, acting like the fools they are.

"I know you missed me but there's no reason to fight over me, ladies," Naruto says cockily to the group of guys.

"Ah, it's the just the jackass," Shikamaru says, fingering a chess piece while Lee and Neji fight over something stupid.

Naruto's eyes glower back at him.

Neji pauses the fight to look at him before quickly dismissing him, "tch, who cares."

Naruto's eyes cut to Neji, and Kiba laughs hysterically saying, "Miss you? That's a joke right?"

Naruto huffs but Shino steps up beside him. "If it's any consolation, I noticed your absence…"

Facepalming himself, he pushes Sai over and sits down beside him. "Soooo…."

"Naruto," Sai replies in acknowledgement.

"You missed me, right? I was gone for a whole _three_ days" he says, poking Sai's bare stomach.

Sai looks over to him and then away again in thought.

"Oh come on, you don't have to think about it! You idiots are all useless!" he says in irritation.

"Useless, huh? What does an _usuratonkachi_ like you have any business calling us useless? Of course we didn't miss you, dobe!" Sasuke spits from behind Naruto.

Sai watches Naruto's face twitch and smirks, going back to his sketch book.

The blonde grinds his teeth, "ah, teme, allow me to prove you wrong!" He stands and waves a large plastic ziploc bag in front of Sasuke's face.

"D-dumbass! Don't wave that around!" Sasuke whispers harshly, snatching the bag from him and stashing it in the nearest bookbag, catching the group's attention.

"Hmm? I did good right?" Naruto asks with a big grin, hands behind his head, proud of himself.

"Damn, Naruto," Sasuke says. "Are you crazy? How did you get that much and why are you stupid enough to bring it here. If someone finds this, we are all dead."

Naruto snickers. "Well, _obviously,_ we just don't get caught," he says, grinning evilly.

"Ugh! Damnit! Now I'm fucking paranoid, you asshole!"

They all sit squeezed onto the bench.

"So guys, with all this weed, we could smoke like all night," Naruto says.

"No way," Sasuke answers. "We split it up, none of us need to do that much. Just use it till it runs out."

Kiba shakes his head slowly, "Yeah, it's not like it's easy to get our hands on this shit anyway, I mean enough of it."

"But seriously man, where'd you get the money?" Sasuke asks, glaring suspiciously.

Naruto ignores the question, looking down at his hands. The table falls silent. He looks back up to see all seven boys looking at him expectantly. He rose his eyebrows and let out a nervous laugh, scratching the back of his head.

"You know, places. Places around, if you know what I mean.."

"What?" Sai asks, simply.

"Uhhhh, it's better you don't know, 'kay guys. Anyway, just love me, 'cause it wasn't fucking easy."

"Ugh, three weeks in and we're not gonna last through freshman year," Sasuke complains.

"Well, that's where I come in," Shikamaru says with a smirk. "I have enough sense to cover all of your asses. The last thing I will see happen is us all going down before graduation. Trust me."

Lee replies with false excitement, "I guess we're a different-minded group of delinquents."

"Hn, they never saw us coming. We don't fail, period," Neji agrees, thinking about their middle school years.

"Speaking of, it's time for class," Sai says, gathering his things and going back inside. Everyone follows behind except for Naruto, Kiba, and Sasuke.

Naruto looks from side to side at the two boys standing on either side of him at the balcony's edge.

"I know why Kiba's here but why you, Sasuke?" Naruto asks.

"What, I can't skip gym like you two losers do every other day?" Sasuke asks nonchalantly, sliding down the rails and sitting on the cement floor, opening up a coke.

A frown tugs on Naruto's lips as he stood in thought. "I mean, sure, but I thought you were a goodie-goodie, unlike us."

Kiba grins.

"Tch, I do what I want. And right now, I don't feel like dealing with Kakashi's class. So, I don't go."

"Whatever," Naruto says as he and Kiba sit down as well.

"Say what you want around the others but tell us," Kiba says to Naruto, closing his eyes.

Sasuke stares over at him.

"You want me to tell this guy?" Naruto asks, incredulously.

"Ugh, you two...it's obvious, that whole enemy stuff is just for show. Well, maybe not at first, but you fight like brothers. The rest are our friends, but we're brothers, the three of us."

Naruto smiles and replies, "true." To his surprise, Sasuke smiles a little to himself too.

"Fine, but only if you meet me at the pond behind the neighbourhood."

"Let me guess, with a lighter and change of clothes."

"Heh, more like a lighter, towel, and boombox," Naruto says, deviously.

Kiba laughs and says, "sounds like a good way to get caught."

"Nope, I've smoked and played music there. Trust me, it's too far from the houses to smell or hear."

"Fair enough, I swallow my words. It sounds like fun."

"Well, meet you then, whenever you can get out after dark," Naruto says.

Naruto hides, watching his friends load onto the buses. He hates the bus and he lives close enough to get home with a forty-five minute walk. However, the stupid principal authority says it's too far. He didn't care. He wasn't much for authority.

He starts on his wooded path hidden from the school to get in the direction of his house. Once he was on the main road, he follows it into his neighbourhood. He starts walking home, once he gets to the door, his hand falters. Just like it does everyday. But like he always does, he hardens his resolve with a deep breath and a firm grip, swinging the door open.

His eyes quickly avert to the downward at the sight of his foster mother knocked out on the couch, needle on the floor. But it sounds silent, too silent, and a sigh of relief floods from his lungs.

He grabs the trashcan and starts throwing the evidence away. The last thing he wanted was to have the Department of Social Services knocking on the door and finding that.

He puts a blanket over her and a pillow under her head. She was a nice lady, really. She just has problems for good reasons but, she cares for him more than anyone else that he'd met in the system.

Suddenly with a sense of urgency, he checks the time. He grimaces and starts collecting what he needs into his bookbag, Sasuke has the bag so he didn't have to worry about that. He climbs out of his bedroom window and jumps the fence and walks until he reaches the pond. It was still bright outside, but he didn't need an excuse to stay away from that house when he knew his foster dad would be home soon. There was no one in the world he was more afraid of.

Throwing his bookbag down and flopping to the ground he smiles. This is his escape. He loves it here, it was beautiful but far enough away that nearly no one knew about it.

His portable speaker is hooked into his his cell, playing his favorite music. He pulls a cigarette out of a small tin box that he hides them in along with a zippo lighter. He lights it up and puffs on it, watching the clouds.

Within an hour, the sky is growing darker. He sat looking at the water, when he gets shoved hard from behind.

"A-asshole," Naruto says, then a big grin spread across his face.

"I'm glad you're here first," Sasuke says with as small grin himself. "I brought the hard liquor," he says, waving a bottle of cold Jack Daniel's.

"Heh, sounds like you. Cigarette?" Naruto asks, passing him one, lighting one up too.

"Thanks."

"So, my bet is, you knew I'd be here first, right?" Naruto murmurs.

Sasuke nods his head slowly. "I figured as much. Since Kiba has to do the whole 'slip-away-from-mom-and-big-sis' thing. You hardly want to go home at all, so, thought you'd be here."

"Hn, I suppose the real question is, what do you wanna talk about?" Naruto asks, looking over at the boy.

"Yeah, well," Sasuke started, pausing before continuing, "I guess about us."

"Things are pretty different now, huh?" Naruto asks gently.

"Mm, yeah. We haven't talked about it...that one time, and it's like since then...I don't hate you so much."

That sat in silence for a moment before Sasuke broke it again, "Don't really know when I came to like you so much, though. That just kinda snuck up on me."

Naruto smirked, "eh, hate...funny word, ya' know. I threw it around so much, but now I'm starting to really learn the meaning."

Naruto threw a stone into the water as hard as he could.

"I mean, when you admire someone...enough to be jealous, then, I dunno, seems like there should be a different word or something."

Sasuke let out a breath."Yeah, hate is too strong, dislike is too weak. I feel like that, but it's like they exist at the same time, love and hate."

Naruto nodded curtly. "Exactly. Hate should be reserved for real monsters." His mind flashed to all the yelling, the sounds of broken glass, the screams, and closed his eyes tight.

They sit quietly for a moment. They talk on occasion, but it was really more of a 'hang-out-and-shut-up' kind of a deal with them. Kiba and Naruto ran their mouths to each other the most, and half of it was shit-talk.

"The party has arrived," Kiba says sarcastically to the two as he approaches. "Almost nightfall, and I knew you to jerkoffs didn't bring a light source," Kiba says lighting two oil lanterns and a few candles he had toted with him.

"So Naruto, if you're smart, you'll strip now…" Kiba warns, nonchalantly. He looks over to Sasuke and an identical evil smile appears on their faces.

Naruto picks up on the hint, stands immediately and began stripping his clothes as fast as possible.

"Eh, damn you guys!" Naruto says, backing away slowly, clad in just his boxers. "I-I wanted to adjust!"

Sasuke says to Kiba, never taking his eyes off of Naruto, in a cold tone, "on the count of three."

Kiba says with a laugh, "three!" They both lunge at him, each grabbing an arm and flinging him up and throwing him hard into the freezing pond water.

A scream echoed as he hit, and he came back up to the surface, dramatically sputtering and yelling how cold the water is.

"Ah, shit," Sasuke spat.

"Yep, he's coming for revenge," Kiba said, taking off his clothes as fast as possible and Sasuke joined.

Naruto crawled out of the pond shaking his head like a dog and took a swig of the whiskey.

"Who's first?" Naruto asked in a tone of vengeance.

They both bolted and Kiba screamed, "not me!" but before he got away, Naruto caught his arm and dragged Kiba to the edge of the pond, pushing him and jumping in beside him.

"Sas-uke?" Naruto taunted with an evil laugh.

"No, never! I'll kill myself before you'll ever have the satisfaction!" Sasuke yelled dramatically from behind a tree several feet away. He ran and jumped in, joining them. "D-damnit dobe! You and your bad ideas. This water is fucking freezing!"

"Ahahahaha, grow some balls, Uchiha!"

Sasuke growled and splashed him.

Kiba erupted into laughter. "You're both fucking idiots!"

"Yeah, well you're no exception dog-boy!"

"Yeah, yeah, love you too." Kiba climbed out of the water, toweling his hands.

"Kiiiiibaaa!" Naruto complained, as Sasuke left him to swim around.

"What? This weed ain't gonna roll itself."

"Heh, fine," Naruto replied, swimming off to grab Sasuke's leg underwater.

After Kiba finished, he yelled, "come and get it, bitches!" while waving his ass in the air to Naruto's hip hop.

"Tch" Sasuke said, rolling his eyes as he gave Naruto a hand.

"Twerk it, Kiba!" Naruto said through laughter. "Your wet ass, if you knew what you looked like right now, haha." He snatched the joint from him and took a long drag and began immediately coughing.

The other two boys tried to contain their laughter.

"That's some strong shit, go easy on that," Naruto warned.

Sasuke took it next and they sat in a circle. "You're right."

"Told ya,'" Naruto replied, satisfied.

"You're both wussies, pass it over." Kiba took a long drag and after inhaling, his eyebrow rose.

"Bout time you tell us where you got this."

Naruto grimaced like earlier, but his face brightened as he remembered something. "So, you guys want to be brothers, right?" He asked excitedly.

Kiba and Sasuke exchanged glances. Kiba spoke up, "yeah, that's what I said earlier, what about it?"

"He's dodging," Sasuke explained.

"Nuh uh! I'm serious. I want to be blood brothers!"

Sasuke's brow rose, "what? How?"

"Easy," Naruto explained, fishing in his bookbag and pulling his hunting knife, "cut both your wrists."

"What!?" Kiba asked incredulously but Sasuke was on Naruto's wavelength.

"Hn, I get it. We each cut both wrists then each of us holds hand in a circle," Sasuke explained.

"Yup, then our blood mixes. Cool right?"

"On principle at least," Sasuke agrees.

They look to Kiba.

"Sounds like some pretty bad ass creepy voodoo ritual. We can let the weed burn in the middle, hey I'm in," Kiba says with a smirk.

"Weed burning in the middle, huh? Yeah and the liquor to clean the cuts," Sasuke adds.

"Well, guess I'm first," Naruto says, cutting the first slice into his wrist and then the second, making a hissing sound.

He passes it to Sasuke and he does the same, cutting both wrists and passing the knife to Kiba. Sasuke and Naruto hands grasp eachothers inner arms. Kiba followed and the circle completes. After a minute they let go and Sasuke pours the jack daniels on the other's wrists and then his own. Naruto grabs the joint and puffs, blowing a large cloud in the air, finally feeling the affects of the booze and pot.

"I wish we could...just stay here forever."

* * *

><p><span><strong>Endnote:<strong>

So the super cool thing about not really knowing where the hell a story's direction is going is that I get to ask you guys so...please if you have any ideas or things you want to see happen I will seriously consider them. Of course, as always if you are so awesome as to leave a review telling me that you liked it or hated it for some reason or another, Thank You! Because it really helps :)

**-Malevolent-Chan**


End file.
